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IRIM Launches Vintage Robotics Research Video Series

Jul 25, 2016 | Atlanta, GA

The Institute for Robotics and Intelligent Machines (IRIM) at Georgia Tech has launched a new series of robotics research videos on YouTube. Donated by Dr. Clinton W. Kelly III, a member of the College of Computing’s advisory board and a longtime benefactor of Georgia Tech, the diverse collection of videos covers an extended period of time and offers a behind-the-scenes look at different aspects of the earlier days of unmanned vehicle and other robotics research conducted across multiple institutions, companies, and funding agencies.

Kelly’s distinguished career includes serving as director of the U.S. Strategic Computing Program and executive director of the Information Science and Technology Office at DARPA (the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency). Subsequently, he served as the CTO for SAIC (Science Applications International Corporation). He has also held a number of advisory positions with universities, including Duke, CMU, and Georgia Tech.

The first video in the series features the Leg Lab, established at CMU by Marc Raibert and later moved to MIT. The Leg Lab developed robots that ran and maneuvered like animals and formed the basis for the company Boston Dynamics, which was founded by Raibert in 1992. The video shows some of the early examples of legged robots from monopods to quadropeds.

Through a collaborative effort, led by Henrik I. Christensen, IRIM’s founding executive director, and Josie Giles, marketing and communication manager, IRIM will regularly publish additional video clips from the collection on YouTube to offer the general public a unique insight into the foundational work on robotics technologies.